Thomas Page McBee with Use Lahoz

The US journalist and amateur boxer Thomas Page McBee was the first transsexual boxer to fight at Madison Square Garden. But, of course, that’s just a headline; his story goes far beyond that achievement because his is not a simple narrative of overcoming or of success. Born with the body of a woman, he couldn’t have surgery until he was thirty. When he did, it not only changed his body, it changed his perception of the world. In Man Alive: A True Story of Violence, Forgiveness and Becoming a Man (2014) he explains in the first person how that in turn changed his view of masculinity and its privileges. He realized that he had learn to relate in a different way, so he enrolled in a boxing gym to explore issues such as violence and identity. At Primera Persona, McBee talks to the writer and lecturer Use Lahoz, author of novels such as Los Baldrich or Los buenos amigos.

Participants: Thomas Page McBee, Use Lahoz

11 May 2019